Question that I spotted recently- How does time influence us? HT: John Hovell
Such a critical question that many of us probably don't think about often! A movie I watched has helped me refine my thoughts on this topic. Thinking about it linearly, at one extreme end of the spectrum, we have people who are slaves of time and will dance to its tunes almost always.
Ironically, these are the people who want to conquer time, squeeze in everything possible and stuff the 'Time' bag till they are sure it can't hold any more. Which implies they are always under pressure and the dark cloud of unfinished tasks constantly hovers over their heads. They are likely to just fleet through most things in life as they are waiting for the next thing to happen. I can't help but think that the problem has become more severe with the explosion of concepts like multi-tasking, social networking and the subsequent personalized information glut. (Earlier it was plain information glut, with no special messages attached to it which means it was easier to ignore).
Those of us who are stuck in this constantly churning wheel of time would hardly enjoy the ride. And we have ourselves to blame for it. We are perhaps competing against others with time as the measure, have no clue about our real priorities and are addicted to busyness so as to shut off our wandering minds.
At the other end of the spectrum, we have people who may have no respect whatsoever for time and would rarely care about its delicate rules or limitations. Such a strong lack of respect for time can be no good either. It smacks of a lack of purpose, lack of knowledge of situations, lack of awareness of other social elements and addiction to laziness.
As in everything else, we need to hunt for Zen, the middle path, that lets us get the better of time when it really matters (a surgery, a relationship etc) and let it go when there is a need to pause for breath, joy, meaning and clarity of thought. A middle path that lets us take our eyes off the clock, slow down frequently and enjoy the moment that we occupy so much that the clock too is forced to stop in order to watch us.
In short, too much focus on time will lead to a negative impact on the quality of our lives while a lack of focus on time will reduce the quality of the positive impact we have on life.
